Kansas City Fashion Week: Whitney Rorah Spotlight + Win Two Tickets!

Only two days and counting until we kick off Kansas City Fashion Week — three amazing days of runway shows featuring 20 fabulous fashion designers at Kansas City’s own Union Station. Getting ready for the grand event, we caught up with Whitney Rorah whose stunning formal gowns will be returning to the Kansas City stage for the second time this year.

“Kansas City is an amazing city,” said Whitney. “The raw talent that resides in that city, whether it is a fashion, music, or artistic, brings art enthusiasts to the city. There are so many people that appreciate local talent and that following is what helps keep local and Midwestern designers in business.”

Whitney’s collection is set to steal the spotlight this Saturday. While she’s created bridal gown collections in the past, her newest styles are evening wear-focused. Each incorporates her staple intricate surface designs adding depth to the piece. The absolutely gorgeous Fall/Winter 2015 collection incorporates navy, black, ice blue and Cabernet red with intricate textures creating a beautiful lace motif.

The amazing patterns are created from laser-cut shapes and fabric manipulation. To create them, Whitney cuts thousands of small 1-2’’ circles from chiffon fabric and folds them to create a triangular wedge. Those triangular wedges are, then, layered and sewn over the lace motifs providing shape and depth. After that, hand beading is added to finish the lace motifs.

In her own words, “the silhouettes are conservative and regal for women of all ages.” And we couldn’t agree more. The sophisticated collection is exceptionally eye-catching without being overly revealing. The shape, color and texture all blend wonderfully to create a stunningly royal look with a wildly unique design. “The wow factor is definitely within the surface design.”

Like most creative minds, inspiration for Whitney’s collections comes from many places. For the collection she’s showing, she began by experimenting with surface design techniques. Once she developed a technique to fit her vision for depth in the designs, she started working through concepts for where and how those elements would be placed on the gowns.

Her background fuels that creative mind. “Throughout my whole childhood I have taken on projects that showed my creativity,” said Whitney. “I watched my grandmother sew when I was a teen — and by watching her create garments from a square piece of fabric, I got the itch to try as well. In high school I started adding elements to my prom and homecoming dresses to make them my own.” Fashion wasn’t an immediately clear path for her though. After high school, she pursued a degree in Biology with plans to become a dentist. After realizing she needed a more creative outlet, she began drawing classes and eventually transferred to Iowa State University to study Apparel Merchandising and Design — emphasizing the creative design.

Surrounded by so much creativity and focusing on the intricate details of fashion from day to day — we were curious to know how the collection reflects Whitney’s personal style. She said it changes frequently but she usually dresses comfortable, classic and professional. “You can’t beat comfort, especially in my line of work where you need to be able to move around a lot. My collections have a high level of intricacy involving hand made elements such as flowers and hand beading, where my personal style is a lot more simplistic.” We think the balance of the two could not be more beautifully apparent than it is in the collection.

The stunning Whitney Rorah collection will walk the runway on Saturday, March 21 during the 8 p.m. show. Meet Whitney in the cocktail area at Union Station after the showcase or visit whitneyrorah.com to shop and place orders. There, you can view past and current collections or request custom designs for your special event.

In celebration of Kansas City Fashion Week, Whitney Rorah and Prettyography are excited to give away a framed Whitney Rorah original sketch and a pair of Kansas City Fashion Week tickets — granting one lucky Prettyography reader free access to Saturday’s shows! Enter below to win!

That’s it. Do both and we’ll take it from there. Hurry to enter – this contest will close at 11:59 p.m. on Thursday, March 19. Winners will be contacted via the medium in which they participate (in this case, Facebook) shortly after our drawing. Unresponsive winners or failure to provide contact information for delivery of the prize may result in us choosing another winner and you, well, losing. Let’s not let that happen!

This post originally appeared on Prettyography.